Small Business Owners Can't Afford a Decent Website
Business owners, often with limited technical skills and budgets, are overwhelmed by the complexity and cost of creating and maintaining a website. They seek simple, manageable solutions that allow them to control their online presence without relying on expensive developers or complex platforms. The lack of transparency in pricing further compounds the frustration.
SOURCES (60)
“you should hire someone, gives websites a human element, I have a friend up for hire.”
“elementor is better than wp bakery but I've used both. if you want a really nice nav bar and cool extras, you'll have to pay, elementor pro is about NZ$90 for a year.”
“I have no clue about programming, so I really need an easy-to-use website builder. What's the best platform for that: WordPress, Squarespace, or Wix? submitted by /u/tiago_brettas [link] [comments]”
“For furniture, I’d start simple: listings, dimensions, condition, delivery/pickup rules, and a way to book or request a time slot. You probably don’t need an expensive custom website yet. The website should mainly reduce the same back-and-forth questions you get on Facebook. If it can answer “is it available?”, “how big is it?”, “can I pick it up?”, and “what’s the next step?”, that’s already doing useful work.”
“I'd say get the client to buy the license. Thing is some of those fonts the client likes cost a ridiculous amount of money depending on number of licenses require, web font, apps etc. https://www.atipofoundry.com have some nice fonts and clear licensing.”
“If you're comfortable with Gemini and you enjoy learning, you can definitely build a basic website yourself. For a furniture business, I'd focus on a clean homepage, a gallery of your products, customer reviews, and a simple contact form. If you want features like appointment booking, SEO, faster performance, and a polished design that builds trust, that's usually where hiring someone starts to make sense. For a simple business website, I'd expect anywhere from $500-$1,500 USD ,”
“Squarespace if it's mostly a portfolio/service site and you want it to look polished without much fiddling. Wix if you think you'll want bookings, a store, or random third-party tools bolted on later — its app marketplace is genuinely bigger. Neither is great for SEO out of the box, though Wix has improved a lot the last couple years. One thing nobody's mentioned yet: if you outgrow either one, migrating your content off isn't clean — there's no real export. So it's less”
“I sell Furniture on facebook, im transitioning to google reviews and a website now, think i can setup a basic website with time slots and a few listings or should i just pay someone? I can use gemini pretty well. I just got a domain, im all about efficiency so i dont want to overpay.. can you guys tell me a typical price for something like this? ballpark? submitted by /u/Sufficient_Key9080 [link] [comments]”
“I work at a small business, I want to make a client facing website and a management platform. my question is, since my last time that i programmed it has been several years, what are the relevant methods, tools and stack to develop a project ? I have no experience in ai assisted coding, but im willing to catch up. my main problem is an overflow of information online, and each one seems to be not complete, and i dont know how to approach it, i can somehow manage to build it, but i dont want it to”
“Perf is important for sure, but don't overlook accessibility also... scummy lawyers out there like to prey on SMBs with accessibility issues”
“I'd rather spend my time building something useful than another practice project. So here's the deal: If you're a small business owner, freelancer, or someone who needs a website, I'll build it for you for FREE. I'm doing this to get real experience, and in return I'll only ask if I can showcase the project in my portfolio. If this sounds useful, my DMs are open. submitted by /u/crupidAi [link] [comments]”
“You could offer him an hourly rate for the first 3-6 months to see how much work it takes, then quote a flat fee from there.”
“I'm based in the US and my site would be hosted on US servers. However, it'd be open for anyone globally to use”
“Neither. If you are building static websites without a database, use a GUI website builder such as Squarspace or Wordpress. This will allow clients to make small content updates without needing to know any programming. Paying attention to edge functions or any other advanced features from cloud providers is unnecessary since your clients want simple marketing sites without a database.”
“What kinda business is this? Will you want to make changes to the site often, or is it a set once and leave typa site?”
“I wish I could show you my squarespace website to see if you think it looks better or worse than what Mirin offers. I think the Mirin website is 10x more streamlined and loads faster. Obviously I could replicate some of what they did when they took my website and optimized it, but I don't think it would exactly be as clean.”
“I do freelance web setup on the side, and the unpaid admin work is killing me. Every client asks "how much for a site?", and when I ask for details they send a messy wall of text with half the info missing. I spend days emailing back and forth just to get their logo files and domain info, only to get ghosted. HubSpot is way too heavy/expensive for my scale. Standard forms don't work because I can't update them on progress afterwards. How do you automate this? Is there a simpler”
“Was thinking of using one to boost SEO for my new SaaS after / before I launch. The pricing ive seen usually starts around $200, I know I could list my website myself but I am lazy and that sounds like it would take days to do. any one have any experience with these tools? or just doing it yourself? if its easy enough to do maybe ill just do it myself. Also anyone thats used a directory listing tool, did you see a boost in visits from organic seo? do you think it was worth it and would you do it”
“There are hundreds of paid themes and the reviews don't tell you much. If you've used a paid theme long term, which one would you buy again? What made it worth it for you? Speed, design flexibility, support, built-in features? And is there anything you still had to fix with apps or custom code? submitted by /u/Resident_Elevator991 [link] [comments]”
“There are hundreds of paid themes and the reviews don't tell you much. If you've used a paid theme long term, which one would you buy again? What made it worth it for you? Speed, design flexibility, support, built-in features? And is there anything you still had to fix with apps or custom code? submitted by /u/Resident_Elevator991 [link] [comments]”
“I'm curious to learn what platforms Micro SaaS founders prefer (Wordpress, Webflow, Headless CMS, etc). submitted by /u/SpaceBoatDvlp [link] [comments]”
“I keep getting quotes that are all over the place. Some are really cheap while others are several thousand. For anyone who has actually paid for a professional website what did you end up spending and did you feel like you got your money's worth submitted by /u/Thesinisterguy [link] [comments]”
“That’s right. But based on what you need, you are going to need both of those things anyway. Certainly WordPress out the box will need some custom code if you are going to achieve that.”
“The web design market is in a weird phase right now. With AI making it so easy to build websites, I keep seeing people say that web design is saturated, every business owner knows how to build their own website now, and agencies are dead. I disagree big time. I've held over 500 web meetings where I've presented businesses with redesigned versions of their websites, and it's actually rare that I meet someone who even knows how capable AI has become for building websites. Business owne”
“Hey! I saw your post about getting stuck with your Squarespace website. I’m Mike, and I run OddJobzz Digital Services in Saskatchewan. I could help you organize the pages, finish the mobile layout, connect your forms/domain, and make sure visitors have a clear way to contact or book with you. I can also walk you through how to update it afterward. If you want to send me the preview link and a quick description of the business in a DM, I can take a look and give you a fixed scope and price before”
“Square Online has a free tier and a paid tier around £16/month, slightly over your budget but worth checking since it handles payments cleanly for UK customers and the drag and drop editor is genuinely simple. Wix's ecommerce plans start around £17/month so that's over budget unless you catch a discount period. Storebox is also worth a look, it's a managed service rather than a pure drag and drop builder, so instead of building it yourself they build and run the whole thing including”
“Personally I prefer to code my own websites with Laravel or NextJs since I can get the most flexiblity and performance out of it. If you are not a developer you could host a wordpress site on your own server. You can buy a nice theme for like 50$ while still being pretty flexible. You need to optimize wordpress a bit for performance amd SEO but it's not that hard. There are tons of tutorials out there. Also you could start some google ad campaigns for like 1-5$ a day to increase your visibil”
“I've been using SquareSpace and it's fine but I do notice it's not the easiest to modify it exactly how I want it. The SEO stuff I did as much as I could on my own but honestly haven't done a deep dive into what more I could do. My website is for a health services business so not necessarily eCommerce. Just considering to see if this increases my visibility and brings in more clients or not.”
“My wife are opening a small business and need help with developing a website. We are using Squarespace but are really stuck. How do we find someone to help or someone to build it for us? submitted by /u/Formal_Feeling78 [link] [comments]”
“Make it the most simple: wordpress.com; premium for 100$ a year. You create site, they take burden of backend (security, speed, etc). KISS still rules.”
“Hello. I am a complete beginner to web design and wanted to develop a website for myself. I got BSS and made great progress with building practically my entire site. However, I did this all while under the XL view. I was not aware that you should build your site at the mobile view first. Now, I have a site that looks great on all of the laptop and desktop views, but completely broken on anything tablet and below. Is this something that can be easily fixed? Or do I have to throw away all of the t”
“I keep seeing Design.com come up when I'm searching for Canva alternatives. Has anyone here actually used it? Is it any good, or are there better options for logo design? submitted by /u/No_Path_4504 [link] [comments]”
“For an author site, skip the coding; Squarespace or WordPress.com will get you live in a day. Buy a domain from Namecheap, point it there and you're done. Start simple, get your books out first.”
“Hello everyone, I have been working as a WordPress designer for about 6 months. To be honest, my PHP knowledge is still quite limited, because up until now I have mostly handled everything through page builders. However, I do have a background in software development. I previously worked professionally as a .NET Developer for a while. On the side, as a hobby, I am also interested in Rust, compilers, CLI tools, and systems programming. Over the last few years, I had to take a long break from prog”
“Hello everyone, I have been working as a WordPress designer for about 6 months. To be honest, my PHP knowledge is still quite limited, because up until now I have mostly handled everything through page builders. However, I do have a background in software development. I previously worked professionally as a .NET Developer for a while. On the side, as a hobby, I am also interested in Rust, compilers, CLI tools, and systems programming. Over the last few years, I had to take a long break from prog”
“You don't know coding? I would say it is better to go with a website builder. You can still use vibe coding with it, depending on how flexible the website builder is, to allow you to copy/paste your code in. Maybe you are looking at the wrong website builders. I use UltimateWB. It costs less than the others and is really flexible. And moving a section is quick. You can change your whole website formatting or styling with one click.”
“It really depends what the site does. If its just a website for your business idea with basic functionality learn wordpress and use AI. If it is an actual application then you have to determine what your priorities are based on what you can afford and a realistic measurement of your limited skills.”
“If you don’t have a computer, those recommendations of using Wix, squarespace don’t apply (and they have a high running cost). You need a computer to make a website really. I would suggest self hosted Wordpress, but, again you really need a computer. Thinking out the box, instagram, facebook, behance may be a good way to showcase your work. I know it helps to have a website it social media is also a good way to build a portfolio. For a custom email, Zoho is good. If you’re looking to hire someon”
“If you’re asking because you don’t understand the business model: the guy loses money on one client, but makes his money on a few hundred clients. You might ask him for work on your site, but 95% of his clientele doesn’t give a shit and just launches their site and forgets about it. They make up for the hours he spends working on yours. Don’t sweat it”
“Depends. Are you making changes to it regularly? is it ecom or lead gen stuff? AI can build a landing page and deploy it to the web for almost nothing... free hosting as well on things like netlify/verce l/cloudflare (these are the big boys in the market).... free for the first couple sites (not promoting, just saying they used a lot) The oldschool (and sorta normal way) is to have a a server that your site runs on (I have several company sites on these...) but if you need a normal "hvac si”
“https://www.canva.com/features/photo-to-sketch/ + https://www.remove.bg/ What would the approximate cost be to self host something like this online? I don't need the fastest speeds but the goal would be something the last photo (on the right) for transparent .png sketch. The hover effect would change the background, thus transparent .png or .webp would be ideal. So maybe the sketch is one task, isolation for transparency is another task? Any help or guidance greatly appreciated! submit”
“This. I know is been like.. two years, but i want to start building landing pages as a freelancer and then move to something bigger. HMTX caught my eye because i think it's great that someone could be able to build a fully interactive site without Js. Don't get me wrong, i use React Native in a daily basis, and i know Astro is pretty powerful too, but i don't want to learn something too complicated just yet, so do you think HMTX is a good starting point? Or should i ditch the idea an”
“This isn't a promotion post. I'm genuinely looking for honest feedback from people who use Canva every day. A few years ago I realized something. Designing in Canva feels effortless. Building a website... doesn't. Every website builder I tried made me feel like I had to think like a developer instead of just creating. That frustration pushed me to start building my own platform. The goal wasn't to compete with Canva. It was to make building websites feel as visual and intuitive a”
“I’d go with shopify if you want something that’s easy to set up. One thing, I’d do right away is get your domain name before someone else does. I couldn’t find a decent .com that wasn’t already taken so I ended up with a .shop domain instead. It actually made it a lot easier to get a shop brandable name I was happy with.”
“You can get by with Wix, but Shopify will make things a lot easier in the long run.”
“Thank you I am web designer most of the time I use AdFrame itself to create app mockups haha Otherwise the best way to do stunning websites is to find some that you like or would match your vision and base on this you can tweak it and make it more personnal to your brand. Having a design system is crucial”
“We are exploring the many ecommerce no code site builders and most of the posts I found were close to a year old. Hoping to get some feedback to see if there is a clear winner in this space. We have experience with Shopify, though once the catalog got near 1k products the collection filters kept breaking and it started to feel heavier than we actually need. submitted by /u/Longjumping_Mine_410 [link] [comments]”
“It is unlikely that you’ll have to pay any money if you’re approached and you fix the issues. That being said knowing ADA compliance is a huge part of being a professional web developer.”
“I wanna start a website design company too - how do you get clients may i ask? Word of mouth? Connections? Or cold targeting and DMs?”
“How much should I charge to develop a website for a client. The client already has a domain and wants me to setup appointment scheduling using a CRM that they are also paying for. They only want me to setup appointment scheduling but not payment. I am new to web development and am willing to lowball it to get the job and have something to add to my resume since I was referred to the client by a friend.”